Zee Makes Peace With Star, To Join Dth Network

Zee TV and STAR TV have decided to bury the hatchet, putting at rest speculations of Zee TV, Zee Cinema and El TV being thrown off Asisat-1 and STAR starting its own Hindi channel.

In an apparent move to smoke the peace pipe, Zee TV's co-promoter Subhash Chandra has reportedly agreed to join STAR's direct-to-home (DTH) television service, slated to begin soon, with Zee TV and Zee Cinema.

STAR, which plans to start its DTH service under the brand name of India Sky Broadcasting, had told advertising agencies late last year that the service will be launched on April 2 this year and is all set to unveil its plans on Wednesday.

According to Mumbai-based sources in both the companies, the deal also involves restructuring of the management of Zee Telefilms Ltd (ZTL) and Zee Networks. Zee Telefilms is an Indian company which exports programmes to Hong Kong-based ATL promoted by Chandra and media baron Rupert Murdoch which has leased the Asiasat-1 transponder for Zee TV.

The relationship between the two companies had deteriorated over the last five months following the introduction of Hindi programmes on STAR Plus channel by STAR TV, a subsidiary of the News Corp controlled by Murdoch.

In turn, Zee was accused of not passing on the revenue it earned commensurate to STAR's investments in Zee Networks.

STAR TV's chief executive for South Asia R Basu and Zee Networks chairman Subhash Chandra went abroad recently and were reported to have held talks independently with News Corp officials, including chairman Murdoch.

STAR TV's chief executive for the Asia region Gary Davey, too, was in town last week and held talks with Chandra on various issues, including future investment in Siti Cable.

A cable distribution company, Siti Cable is a joint venture between Chandra and Murdoch.

Neither Basu nor Chandra could not be contacted in Mumbai yesterday despite repeated attempts as they were incommunicado with their mobile telephones also switched off.

News TV India Ltd (NTIL), the company which manages STAR's affairs in the country, had protested earlier this year against Siti Cable shifting STAR Plus from the prime band to midband, which is not easily accessible to most of the country's viewers.

In late February, ZTL charged STAR with copyright violation for a Rajat Sharma-hosted programme,